


hold me in this wild, wild world

by JustATinyTurtle



Category: Lost in Space (TV 2018)
Genre: AU where Don and Judy actually interact while all this is happening, AU where Judy stays behind and doesn’t go with the kids, F/M, It just happened, idk they have minds of their own, they hold hands a lot???
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-09
Updated: 2020-01-09
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:48:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22185883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustATinyTurtle/pseuds/JustATinyTurtle
Summary: “Thanks for visiting me in prison,” he joked.“Of course. Though, I do expect the favor to be returned when some Robinson shenanigan or another lands me in the same position.”“You have my word.”Alternate Universe where Don and Judy actually interact while all the action is happening on the Resolute.
Relationships: Judy Robinson/Don West
Comments: 12
Kudos: 60





	hold me in this wild, wild world

**Author's Note:**

> I don’t actually know what this is, it just happened. But enjoy.

A crumpled-up piece of paper rolled across the floor, making soft sounds as it bounced. Judy bent over to pick it up. 

“It’s a lot of customers you still have,” she remarked as she unfolded the paper and smoothed it out. 

Don let out a small chuckle as he sat on the bed in his “cell”. “Former customers. Now it’s just a list of people I have to hide from.”

Judy leaned up against the doorway and questioned, “even though you saved my sister?”

“Former customers don’t really care about that.”

She paused and looked at him in the eyes. “Thank you.” She spoke in a low tone, conveying how serious she was. “Thank you for saving her. I know that you’re in here because of it.”

Don swallowed thickly and just nodded. “She’s family,” he gave as an explanation. 

While not an out-of-the-blue revelation that Don West thought of the Robinsons as family, Judy still found herself surprised. She, of course, had heard about his home life back on Earth and knew it wasn’t ideal; so the fact that he was willing to use the term “family” and actually have it mean something good this time, filled her with a sense of warmth.

She walked over and sat beside him, squeezing herself onto the tiny mattress up against the wall. She took his hand in hers. “You’re family, too. Any one of us would have done the same thing if it was you in there instead of Penny.”

He flipped his hand over, palm facing upward, so he could lace their fingers together. He kept his gaze fixed on the wall in front of him. “Thanks.” 

“You know,” she started with a smile and a tone that conveyed that she was trying to cheer him up. “Once we get to Alpha Centauri, everyone will hear about your heroism and all will be forgiven.”

“Is that how it works?” He finally turned his gaze to her and let out a chuckle at the hopeful smile on her face. “Yeah, maybe. If we get there.” 

“Well, my mom and Will are coming back with the Robot. We’ll get there.” 

“I admire your optimism, Judy Robinson. It never fails to impress me,” he remarked as he shook his head. 

“What else am I supposed to do? Be a pessimist and use sarcasm to hide my feelings?” She raised an eyebrow as she nudged him with her shoulder. 

“Hey, don’t knock it until you try it,” he let out a genuine laugh. 

Judy took a moment to observe the man sitting next to her. She smiled at the brief moment of him being completely worry-free. His head was tilted back slightly and his eyes crinckled around the corners, smile reaching his eyes. His hand squeezed hers gently and she squeezed back in return. 

“Thanks for visiting me in prison,” he joked. 

“Of course. Though, I do expect the favor to be returned when some Robinson shenanigan or another lands me in the same position.”

“You have my word.”

Before Judy could respond, Penny’s head popped through the doorway. “I hate to disrupt whatever’s happening here but we have a slight situation on our hands.”

Don freed his hand from Judy’s right as Penny set her gaze upon the pair. “What’s wrong?”

“Dad decided Doctor Smith was trustworthy and he was wrong. I know, it’s a shocker, but he’s under house arrest just like Don now,” Penny explained. 

“Is he okay?” Judy spoke up.

“He’s fine, I just figured you would want to know.”

Judy turned to face Don. “I’m gonna go check up on him. I’ll come back when I get a chance.”

“Just let me know what happens,” Don nodded. He laid his hands on each side of Debbie’s head, pretending to cover her ears. “The only gossip around here comes from Debbie at the moment so it leaves me wanting for entertainment.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Judy smirked as she exited the room with her sister. 

When they were far enough away from the room, Penny spoke up. “Okay, do you want to explain what that was?”

“What what was?” Judy asked innocently. 

“You two were literally holding hands when I walked in,” Penny blinked at her sister, waiting for her to elaborate. “What’s going on?”

Judy scoffed. “Nothing’s going on, Penny.”

“Are you dating?” Penny squinted her eyes and peered at her sister. She looked as if she were trying to deduce the truth simply by looking at Judy. 

“That’s ridiculous. I was just thanking him for saving your life.”

“Okay...” Penny trailed off, still not completely convinced. 

She opened the door to their Jupiter and the two girls made their way to the ‘living area’ where their dad was seated at the table. 

“What happened?” Judy asked as she noticed the ankle bracelet around her dad’s leg. 

“Smith and I broke in to listen to some audio recordings that the bridge redacted,” he explained calmly. 

“Why would you trust Smith?” Judy’s voice rose in volume as she stared at her father incredulously. 

“If you need to break in somewhere and listen to hidden files, you take someone who can get you in and has access to said files. It wasn’t a tough call.”

“She turned on you!”

“I told her to. This way everyone on the bridge still trusts her and I still got what I wanted.”

Judy shook her head. “You wanted to end up on house arrest?”

“It wasn’t exactly the outcome I wanted but beggars can’t be choosers,” John sputtered. 

“What was in the audio files?” Penny spoke up. 

“Robots,” John said, his voice taking on a grave tone. “Lots of them. They’re close. The bridge wants to leave now before they can get any closer.”

“Now?” Penny questioned. “There are people on the planet down there! We can’t just leave them!”

“I know,” John nodded his head in agreement. “Your mother is on the bridge right now trying to convince them to let the other people on board the Resolute. The only problem is that we don’t have enough clean water, it’s been contaminated by the rust. She’s up there showing them a way to clean it quickly so we can get out of here.”

“Will it work?” Judy asked.

“If we can convince the crew to go against orders and man the equipment that we need to clean the water.”

“So...”

“So Penny’s gonna break Don out of jail.”

• • •

“Hey Ava,” Don grinned cheekily as he caught sight of his fellow mechanic. 

She walked over to him and eyed the cart he was rolling around on. Of course he would figure out a way to escape his cell without technically leaving the boundaries of the house arrest band. “You know I’m going to have to report this.”

“How many people do you have on the planet down there?” Don interrupted, trying to get to the point as quickly as possible. Penny had filled him on all that was happening as she helped him break out of his cell. 

“A lot, why?”

“You’re just going to have to trust me if you all of them to be rescued,” he shrugged. 

“Rescued from what?”

“Look, we don’t have time for this. Are you going to turn me in or not?”

• • •

“The airlock is gonna open with all those workers inside,” Judy mumbled in shock as she sat on the floor, her back up against the wall. 

“They’ll make it out, Jude,” her dad tried to comfort her. 

There wasn’t much the two of them could do at the moment, being locked inside their own Jupiter. 

“The bridge will get a warning that the airlock is open and someone will be able to fix it, right?”

“Yeah, I hope so,” John sighed. “This whole situation is a mess. If we could just clean the water like we wanted to do, none of this would have happened.”

“Mom will figure it out,” Judy nodded, not sure if she was trying to convince herself or her father more. 

“Yeah, she always does,” John whispered. 

• • •

“Are you okay?” John exclaimed as he walked over to Maureen. “What happened?”

“I had to solve a little bit of an airlock problem but it was alright in the end,” she gave a small smile. 

“Did everyone make it out okay?” Judy asked anxiously. 

“Yes,” Maureen stated proudly. “Don and Ava almost didn’t make it out but we got to them just in time.”

“Don was in there with them?” Judy’s voice became small. 

“He’s in the medbay now,” her mother explained sympathetically. “Why don’t you go check up on him?”

Without needing any more encouragement, Judy spun on her heel and made her way down to the medbay. The sound of her feet echoed as she walked seemingly with a purpose. 

The door to the medbay slid open and she found Don and Ava lying side by side on two beds. 

She walked over to Don. “Are you okay?”

He took the small breathing apparatus out of his mouth for a moment so he could respond. “I’ll be fine.” His voice sounded rough, and he put the breathing apparatus back in his mouth.

Judy took a moment to look over his chart before staring back up at him. “Don, you could have died.”

“But I didn’t and I’m here now,” he tried to go for comforting words but the raspiness of his voice wasn’t helping him. 

“Try and get some rest,” Judy fussed over him before walking over to Ava. “How are you feeling?”

The woman gave a weak smile and a thumbs up, opting to not remove her breathing apparatus. 

Judy nodded in understanding and went back to the chair beside Don’s bed. She took a seat. Don shot her a questioning glance and she rolled her eyes. “Just rest.”

Knowing when and when not to pick his battles, Don agreed. 

• • •

Don was brought out of his slumber by the tightness in his chest. Without opening his eyes, he tried to remember why that was the case. 

It all came flooding back: the jailbreak, the mechanic team, the airlock, no oxygen, the medbay. 

He groaned and felt something squeeze his hand. He opened one eye to peer in the general direction and found Judy Robinson, one hand in his and the other working on some sort of... math problem? 

Judy smiled sympathetically, thumb tracing small patterns on his hand. “How are you feeling, Sleeping Beauty?”

“Oh, you think I’m beautiful?” He grinned sleepily up at her. 

She rolled her eyes. “Okay. You feel fine.”

He smiled again at her, lightly squeezing her hand. “What are you doing here?”

“Thought you might want some company when you woke up. Ava left about an hour ago since she was feeling better. Besides, I’m a doctor, I’m here to check up on you.”

“Well, I appreciate it. And the math homework?” He pointed to the paper resting in Judy’s lap, full of scribbles and calculations. 

“The Robots are closing in on us and if the Resolute jumps to Alpha Centauri, they’ll be able to follow. I’m trying to figure out a way to get the engine onto a Jupiter instead of the Resolute. It might give us a better chance,” she explained. 

“Not everyone here can fit on one Jupiter,” his brows furrowed. 

“Yeah,” she sighed, “I know. That’s what I’m working on.”

“Well, what do you have so far?” He sat up, ready to help brainstorm and help her as best as he could. He didn’t let go of her hand but he was electing to ignore exactly why that was. 

“Ninety-seven.”

“Okay, that’s a way smaller number than I thought.” He sounded discouraged. “How do we choose the ninety-seven?”

“There are ninety-seven children aboard the Resolute right now,” she sighed. 

“Oh.” He sat in silence for a moment, letting the idea sink in. Having the children go ahead of them with the Robot would mean all those children leaving their parents behind and taking the Robot with them, minimizing everyone else’s chances of actually finding Alpha Centauri. “OH.”

Judy nodded sadly. “I can’t think of any other way to get the engine out of here. It needs to be a Jupiter because we don’t want the Robots to catch on right away. They can board the Resolute looking for it and the kids can slip away without being noticed for a few minutes.”

“Have you told anyone else about this?” 

“Not yet, you’re the first. I don’t know if I’ll be able to get the parents to agree. I guess I’ll start with my own and see how that goes.”

“So, Penny and Will,” Don trailed off, realizing that if this plan went through, his chances of seeing them again were very small. “Your parents are going to want you to go, too.”

“Yeah they will,” Judy nodded. “But I’m not a kid anymore and they should be the first priority.”

“Believe me I know,” Don chuckled as she gave him a slight glare when she reminded him she wasn’t a child. She had told him enough times since they met and he wasn’t in too much of a place to argue, being slightly immature at times. “Who’s going to captain the ship?”

“Penny, probably. She knows her way around the Jupiter and she’s good with kids. They’ll like her.”

“So you’ve got this all figured out then.”

“I think so. I’m going to go tell my family before it’s too late to get any plan going,” she announced. She stood up from the chair beside his bed and grabbed all of her calculations. She gave his hand a comforting squeeze. “Feel better. We’re lost without Don West out there,” she teased. 

He scoffed. “I’m sure everyone is.”

• • •

“Listen, I got a lot of work to do but I didn’t want to be rude.” Don walked over to where the Robinson family was standing. “I usually skip the goodbyes, but since I don’t owe any of you money there’s no harm, right?” He gave a small smile to Penny and Will. “I’ll see you guys around.”

Will gave him a friendly punch on the shoulder. “See you around, Don.”

Penny frowned and walked up to him, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Thank you for everything.”

He held on tightly. “Of course. You know I’d do it all again in a heartbeat.” He heard her sniff before she took a step back. 

The two youngest Robinsons grabbed their bags, having already said their goodbyes to their parents and sister, and walked towards the Jupiter. 

Judy stood next to Don and took his hand, letting a few tears fall from her eyes as she watched her siblings leave. 

She didn’t know when she would see them again and the thought filled her with dread and despair. 

Don took her hand and laced their fingers together, letting her know that he was there for her. Neither of them took their eyes off the retreating figures. “We’ll find them again. We’ll get to Alpha Centauri and they’ll be there waiting; they can show us all around.” At Judy’s brief smile he continued. “After all, we can’t be lost in space forever, right?”


End file.
